29 October 2009

ilovetypography.com

Oh. My. Gosh.

I suppose I was quite ignorant in my assumption that dafont.com was the only site devoted to my constant need to look at fonts, in the same way that I thought I was the only person on Earth (this word is capitalised, right? Because it's the name of the planet, not like "world" or anything?) who enjoyed fonts. From a young age, I have enjoyed fonts. I know, I know. You've heard this before. I've also loved Japan since I was six, wanted to be an Olympian since 1988, and wanted to go to Stanford since the age of ten. And now, from the long list of "I grew up liking..." I bring you: fonts. Specifically Chicago. It was my first favourite... anything really. Except colour, which was red. ANYWAY. After being converted to Windows in 1997 (yes, I was originally an Apple girl!) I became a stalwart of Arial, which is why my blog is to this day published in Arial. I dislike Helvetica, and sometimes I feel like the only person who does! I also have problems with Times New Roman.

Other favourites have included McZee (from Creative Writer. Did you ever use that? It defined my childhood), and once that novelty wore off, Enchilada, and more recently, Bleeding Cowboys, The Maple Origins, Trashco, and of course, One Fell Swoop, which is in fact the typeface I've chosen for my next tattoo. You can imagine the fun I had designing Donny's birthday card last year. From memory, there are no less than seven fonts in it.

Then I discovered Robert Gould, and realised that I'm not the only typophile around. Gould, who designed one of my favourite Threadless tees, used Helvetica for the design, but I was able to forgive him for this when I found out about his typography habit. He went to see a film about the font. Not obsessed. And THEN I discovered ilovetypography.com. And typornography.com. You get the picture. There are a billion websites about fonts. I've found my niche (at least for the next few days. Next week, I'll probably be informing you about the breeding habits of the Beluga Whale).

It was at ilovetypography.com that I found the following image, which pretty much made my day (that, and the fact that two new Threadless tees showed up at my place this morning).

I don't agree with his font of choice, but you should probably note that when I screenshotted this image, the folder in which it appeared on Picasa was full of screenshots from dafont.com, one of a Geisha, and three of Carly Patterson performing her signature, round-off back handspring double Arabian front dismount. If anything, I <3 Carly.